How To Build A Floor In Your Campervan (Battens, Insulation & Plywood)
After you have cleared out and cleaned up your van, the next task on your list will most likely be to build your van floor, which will provide insulation, structural support, and a level surface for all your interior components.
In this post, we will guide you through our own process of laying a floor in our campervan, and also how you can go about insulating it at the same time!
We hope by the time you finish reading you will be inspired to take the next step in your van build and get started constructing your floor!
If you have any questions regarding what we did with our floor, please feel free to leave us a comment at the end & we will try our best to help!
* DISCLAIMER: There are so many ways to convert a campervan, different materials you can use & methods of doing certain things. We are not experts, we are simply sharing what we have chosen to do & what has worked for us after hours and hours of research. So although we write our blog to help others with their build & recommend products and materials that we have used - please always do your own personal research and do choose methods that you feel comfortable with or that suits your van build & needs!
Materials & Tools We Used
- Plywood Sheets 12mm – purchased from B&Q UK
- Wooden Battens (we used 50mmx25mm) – also purchased from B&Q UK
- Screws
- Construction Adhesive
- Foam Board Insulation (we used 25mm)
- Foil Tape
- Circular Saw or Jigsaw
- Hand saw
- Caulking gun
- Measuring Tape
- Safety Goggles
- Drill
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Step 1 : Strip, Clean & Rust Treatment
The first thing you will want to do before you start to build your floor is to make sure you have cleaned your van, stripped anything out of it that needs to go, and treated any rust that might be present.
We actually wrote a blog post on the steps we took to do this (it was one of the first tasks of our conversion!), so if you want to have a read if you haven’t done so already – check the post out by clicking HERE!
Once we had our van prepped by:
- Clearing it out
- Stripping out the plywood on the walls and our bulkhead
- Hoovering & cleaning it as much as we could
- & finally treating any rusty areas
THEN we got started building our floor!
Step 2: Plan, Measure & Cut
Once you have your van cleaned out & ready to rock, it’s time to get going building the floor!
First of all, we had to figure out where to place our wooden battens on the floor of the van.
We measured everything out and then cut our battens to the size we wanted with a circular saw. We chose to use 50mm x 25mm battens.
We laid them all horizontally first as you can see in the picture below, and once we were happy with the layout, we stuck them down with grip fill adhesive.
After we had stuck them horizontally, we did the exact same process for the battens that would be placed in between, vertically. We measured and cut these with the circular saw, and again stuck them down to the floor with the adhesive.
TIP: When planning on where to lay the battens, we wanted them to align with where we planned to screw any interior fittings in. This meant we would have somewhere to screw into that was more secure!
Step 3: Insulate The Sub-Floor & Wheel Arches
Once we had all the battens down, it was time to get INSULATING the van floor!
TIP: We personally chose to use PIR Insulation Board, as it has a reflective surface on both sides, which helps create a vapour barrier.
Our first task in this step, was to measure out the spacing in between our battens, then cut our insulation boards to that size to infill all the gaps.
Once we had the foam boards in we used foil tape to seal everything up and to create a complete vapour barrier over the whole floor.
As well as insulating the floor itself, we also insulated the wheel arches at this point.
To do this we covered them with closed cell insulation foam, which has self-adhesive and a reflective surface on the other side.
It was simply a matter of cutting it to size then wrapping it around the wheel arch. We used the foil tape again to seal up the joints.
Step 4: Cut & Fit The Plywood
The last step was to put the plywood on top of our battens & insulation to complete the subfloor.
TIP: Andrew used a bit of cardboard as a template to cut the shape around the wheel arches.
We then used that template on the plywood and used the jigsaw to cut out the shape.
Once we had it cut and in place on the floor, we screwed it down to the battens with 30mm screws, doing this for each bit of plywood we put down!
Step 5: Installing Vinyl Flooring
We thought we would add this section in, even though we installed our vinyl flooring a few stages after we built our sub-floor, but we thought it gelled well with this post!
So, once you have your sub-floor down, you can then think about what ACTUAL flooring you might like for your van.
There a different materials you can choose from, such as laminate flooring, wooden flooring, tiles or vinyl!
When researching what floor you would like for your van, consider a material that will be easy to clean, light weight and water resistant! But in the end it will simply come down to your preference & what you like!
We made the decision to go for vinyl flooring because we liked the look of it with the wooden effect, it’s fairly easy to clean, it is lightweight and it was also simple to install.
What we needed to install our vinyl:
- Stanley knife
- Measuring tape
- Vinyl floor
- Spray adhesive
How we did it:
- Rolled the whole piece of vinyl out to cover the whole area.
- Ensured it was lined up as we wanted it
- Used a bit of cardboard to create a template around the wheel arches
- Cut the wheel arches out of the vinyl flooring
- Trimmed around the edges with a Stanley knife
- Stuck it down with spray adhesive
TIP: We decided to put our vinyl down BEFORE we starting installing any of our interior frames or furniture. It means that you aren’t spending ages cutting around furniture, and it gives it a cleaner, smoother look. But again, do what works for you!
Conclusion
When you get the floor built in your campervan, it gives you a nice solid base to work from!
It just takes some patience to measure everything out! 🙂
We hope this post has been helpful and given some ideas on how to build your van floor & where to start.
Again, if you have any questions, feel free to pop them in the comment section below & we will do our best to answer!
Enjoy this post? You may also like:
- How To Strip Out Your Van And Prep It For Converting
- How To Build & Insulate The Interior Walls In Your Van
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